The Samsung t639 looks great, but its performance doesn't measure up. Better options are available for T-Mobile's new 3G network.

The Samsung t639, one of T-Mobile's first four phones for its third-generation network, is a good-looking flip phone that's comfortable to hold. But in my opinion, calls were too quieta big minus for a phone that's primarily dedicated to voice.

The t639 is definitely the best-looking of the four new T-Mobile 3G phones, which include the Samsung t819, the Nokia 3555, and the Nokia 6263. It's a 2-by-3.7-by-0.7-inch flip phone that comes with four easily interchangeable covers in red, green, and two shades of blue. The t639 has a long, narrow, text-only blue display along the outside, which shows time or caller ID information, and a larger, bright, 176-by-220-pixel LCD on the inside. The number keys and action keys are basically flat, with raised ridges between them.

On most carriers, 3G means new data services. Not so with T-Mobile, which has chosen to use its initial 3G rollout primarily to improve voice quality. To avoid high hopes, the company has removed any indication that these phones actually support 3Gyou won't even find an icon. You'll know you're on the new network only when Web browsing gets faster and battery life declines by half.

Right now, in its beginning stages, T-Mobile's 3G network is available only in New York City, but the company says it will roll out the phone nationwide in the course of the yearn. T-Mobile 3G isn't compatible with anyone else's 3G, including that of AT&T and foreign carriers. The new T-Mobile 3G phones are all quad-band GSM, so they'll switch to 2G mode to roam on AT&T or more than 100 foreign carriers, but you'll get 3G speeds and quality only in T-Mobile's native coverage areas.

For a voice-centric phone, the t639 has disappointing earpiece volume. Though voices sounded relatively well-rounded, they were just too quiet. The speakerphone was also less loud than we expected, given the t639's two large, front- facing speakers. There's no in-ear feedback of your own voice, making for a somewhat harsh speaking experience, and while the microphone transmits voices well, it also carries background noise. The t639 paired automatically with our Plantronics Voyager 520 and Pulsar 590A headsets, but once connected, there was noticeable popping and clicking interference. Inconveniently, the t639 features Samsung's proprietary headphone jack, so you can't plug in just any set of headphonesthough the phone is bundled with a headset, albeit a mono one. You also get Nuance's excellent VoiceSignal voice dialing suite.

The t639 is also disappointing for music. The handset accepts microSD cards of up to 4GB (an 8GB SanDisk card didn't work), but the music player is a real pain. It's basically just a file browser; you can't sort by album or artist, it doesn't sync to PCs, and to play more than one song you have to add them laboriously to a playlist. It's hardly worth the effort.

The 1.3-megapixel camera takes photos that come out a little too dark and blue, with some blown-out bright areas in daylight shots. The video-recording mode shoots 176-by-144-pixel videos at 15 frames per second, with a strange and unpleasant wobble to them.

A 3G network is supposed to ramp up data applications, but the t639, like the t819, runs a little short on those. The IM app, which offers AIM, MSN and Yahoo! (one at a time), shows only truncated AIM buddy lists. There's no e-mail program. There is a full Web browser, though, Access's NetFront 3.4, which can handle most Web pages that aren't heavy on scripting. As it does with all its feature phones, T-Mobile blocks unsigned third-party Java applications that access the Net, so no Opera Mini for you on the T639.

One convenient data application, though, is the T-Mobile Address Book, which syncs your phone's contacts with T-Mobile's Web site. That eliminates your having to enter in all your addresses on the phone's keypad. For PC connectivity, the t639's Bluetooth stack is pretty complete, letting you transfer files, browse the phone, and use the handset as a modem. But there's no direct PC syncing application, a capability T-Mobile's new Nokia models do have.

As with all of T-Mobile's initial 3G phones, the t639's data speeds aren't top-notch. Because it's a UMTS-only phone, it supports speeds that top out at only 384 kilobits per second for downloads. T-Mobile's network is capable of at least double that speed with HSDPA phones, which are coming later this summer.

The t639 is good-looking, and we do like the fun removable covers, but we'd rather have performance over prettiness. The Nokia 6263 costs the same as the t639 and is a better overall performer.

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About the Author

PCMag.com's lead mobile analyst, Sascha Segan, has reviewed hundreds of smartphones, tablets and other gadgets in more than 13 years with PCMag. He's the head of our Fastest Mobile Networks project, hosts our One Cool Thing daily Web show, and writes opinions on tech and society.
Segan is also a multiple award-winning travel writer. Other than ... See Full Bio

Samsung SGH-t639

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